Page 128 of Jewel of the Assassin

Some of the crowd stumble, groaning, their limbs like lead. Nothing but slow-moving chaos.

I raise the Makarov in my hands, heart hammering.

Roman watches me. Nothing but pride and retribution.

I fire!

The first shots ring out. Three bullets meet their targets. Blood sprays. Screams echo through the chapel. Fire and smoke drift through the air, lighting up my senses. The acrid scent of gunpowder mixes with coppery blood.

Roman moves with precision, tossing me an extra clip mid-spin. I catch it, grin through my own rising fury, and let my shots fly.

He is a lethal beast who moves like a calculated king across the board, picking off our enemies with purpose and intent.

I am the flame, the blaze, the queen storming across the board, unleashing the legions of hell. No thought. No purpose. Just unbroken and untamed insanity—spinning and spiraling all down the aisle.

Crimson splashes across the marble floors, streaks across pews, and soaks the body of my barely-gown, leaving nothing to the imagination. I don’t care. Every burst of gunfire, every ricochet, every shriek—it’s justice incarnate. My hands are steady, my heart stark ravingmad, fury in my veins.

I pick off anyone reaching for weapons, my eyes sharp as a hawk’s. Some make the mistake of approaching the stained-glass windows—crack! shatter!Shards rain like jeweled daggers dripping with blood and brain matter.

Roman’s shadow moves behind me, back-to-back, a dark god of retribution. He cuts down anyone who dares to flank me. Pride flares in my chest, watching him move with lethal elegance, my storm.

The music shifts mid-chaos. Madonna’s“Like a Prayer”floods the chapel. Roman’s choice. I flick my eyes to him, and he shrugs with a zealous smile.

“I thought it was fitting.” He winks.

I spin on my heel, letting the rhythm take me, thrilling in the song before I take one hand to grip the back of my husband’s blood-smeared neck. “Oh, God, I fucking love you!”

I press my lips to his, and we collide like a storm of fire and brimstone, all teeth and tongue tasting iron and adrenaline. We don’t kiss gently—we maul each other, hard, fast, feral, tasting the chaos on one another.

“Not a dream, Valya,” he says above my lips, our breaths hot and heavy. “It’s a beautiful fucking nightmare.”

All he has to do is nudge the gun barrel along my clit, so wet through the bloody fabric. I’m on such a high, it’s all it takes. I come, nails digging into his scalp, fingers yanking at his hair. The orgasm rips through my system like lightning striking again and again. My nerve endings eat it up.

Roman gazes at me the whole time with a twisted smirk. “So goddamn beautiful, Moya Koroleva.”

“Heaven help me!” I gush, laughing at my play on the song’s words.

“Nothing but hell tonight, Valentina.”

I bob my brows and bite my lower lip. “Let’s bring them more.”

Many are still stumbling around, trying to get to the doors, but they keep slipping on the blood and bodies. It’s quite a picturesque scene. Like the opposite of a Norman Rockwell, married with a Jackson Pollock in all the shades of red. Grimdark and splatterpunk.

Mikhail still has the gun trained on Anton, just daring him to try something. Anton won’t. He’s too much of a coward.

Love and pride fill me at seeing how even Sasha has joined the fold. Two guns primed on our fathers. They all share the same petrified horror in their eyes, glazed from the vodka.

Hair and gown plastered with blood, I revel in the violence and triumph, our vengeance.

Roman’s arm locks around my waist. Together, we are unstoppable, a vortex of wrath and justice. The gunfire is our hymn, our anthem.

One by one, we bring the reckoning to all those who profited from the arena, who cheered while we suffered. We bring the whole goddamn apocalypse down on their motherfucking heads!

I don’t flinch when blood sprays my face. I don’t stop to breathe. My hands are steady, my aim deadly. Roman’s presence at my back. I laugh with fury, love, and liberation.

And even in this splintered, bloody, chaotic cathedral, we find each other. My fingers braid into his hair, my lipsagainst his again, tasting the sweet, iron tang of victory. And in this moment, we are infinite.

King and Queen. Head and Soul.